Picture book treasures for Christmas
Christmas is peak book-buying time and picture books make perfect gifts and stocking fillers for littlies. The bright colours and enchantment of a good story and illustrations never fail to delight.
Three of the books shown above are being published by HarperCollins in early December, just in time for busy parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, friends (and Santa) to buy for the big day.
The fourth, How to Make a Snowman, has been in bookshops since October this year. I have written previously about how much I love Nick Bland’s Bunny and Bird series. As always, in this new version of the friends’ adventures, Bunny is embroidering his fanciful tale whilst being completely oblivious to the action going on behind his back. While he talks of a magical hole from which emerges a bull, a tiger, a bear, sticks, stones and a wombat, Bird has been quietly building a snowman. When it starts to snow, Bunny decides they had better head home when – oh look! – the magic hole has turned into a snowman!
Small readers can again use their observational skills to enjoy the sly humour of this story that plays out in the pictures: an early lesson in subtext, if you will.
The Hullabaloo About Elephant Poo will definitely appeal to the scatalogical tastes of youngsters while teaching them something about the many uses for elephant dung: compost, paper, coffee (!!) gas to power stoves or lights, smoke to repel mosquitos… It is funny, colourful and educational. A nice little package. Dee White’s rhyming text works well with the bright illustrations by Christopher Nielsen.
Costa’s Garden: Flowers by ABC TV favourite Costa Georgiadis and Brenna Quinlan is all about – well, flowers. The motif of a garden gnome is a clever device to get up close and personal many types of flowers we might see in our gardens, and the parts of flowers and the special roles they each play. There is also reference made to the the role of watching and noticing by First Nations people:
Flowers tell stories. They are like a bush billboard. First Nations people read Country and have shared their science and stories of connection to land, sea and sky for generations. Flowers are a signal that other things are happening in nature.
Costa’s Garden : Flowers
There are also some lovely references to Costa’s early garden love, sparked by his grandparents; early memories of sweet peas, carnations and orchids grown by them.
I once lived next door to a four year old who was mad about plants and gardens. He’d be in his late 30s now, but I imagine that if this book had been available then, he’d have absolutely loved it.
Last but not least, Boss of Your Own Mind is the latest offering by the Teeny Tiny Stevies (Byll & Beth Stephen, with illustrations by Simon Howe.) This one is among a welcome and growing number of books addressing young people’s mental well-being. Boss of Your Own Mind talks about some of the situations in life where children can’t control their circumstances (and, being children, there are many.) From the trivial (changes of plans or routine, the weather) to the more profound (hurt feelings, unfair behaviour by others.) The one thing anyone, child or adult, can control, is their response. It’s actually quite a grown-up concept but presented in very child-friendly language and with examples and illustrations that all youngsters could identify with. And definitely finishes on a positive note:
And even though you’re the one deciding,
you might find some days YOU need reminding.
YOU’RE THE BOSS OF YOU’RE OWN MIND!All four books are published by HarperCollins Children’s Books and I thank the publishers for the copies to review.
Christmas picture books
How wonderful to see books celebrating Christmas as we know it in Australia. The ‘Teeny Tiny Stevies’ are back with a new picture book, all about Aussie summer Christmases.
Snowmen, chimneys, plum puddings and dark wintry evenings are all charming, but not part of an Australian Christmas.
Instead, we have hot days in the sun, the long summer holiday, shorts, T-shirts and swimmers in the paddling pool or the beach, the buzz of cicadas and the sting of mozzie bites, pavlova for Christmas lunch.
The pictures by Simon Howe capture the pleasures of long hot days, camping trips, the anticipation of Christmas morning.
I love this book; it is a real portrayal of an Australian summer and our different way of ‘doing Christmas’ here.
Back to the northern hemisphere, we have A Night Before Christmas – with a difference.
A small boy, accompanied by his dog and cat, is witness to the antics of the Elf on the Shelf, who narrates the familiar story of the arrival of St Nicholas with his sleigh and trusty reindeer.
There is a mix of old and new as the much-loved Christmas poem is given a shake up by the elf. The pictures created by author and illustrator Chanda A. Bell are vibrant with saturation colours and plenty of activity.
Together these two books celebrate Christmas in both hemispheres of the globe. They are published in Sept and Oct 2023 by Harper Collins Children’s Books.
My thanks to the publishers for review copies.From stormy to calm: 4 new picture books for frazzled kids (and parents)
In what is perhaps a response to the alarming rise of diagnosed anxiety conditions in young children, here are four new picture books to assist parents and kids find moments of calm and peace.
Two are especially aimed at soothing bedtime dramas and creating a quiet space conducive to sleep.
From ABC Kids and HarperCollins, these sweet little books are all about sleep.
Tjitji Lullaby, by Michael Ross and Zaachariaha Fielding, brings to a board book the lyrics and illustrations of the lullaby story, set in Central Australia. Meaning ‘child’ in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) languages, in Tjitji we have a mother kangaroo guiding her joey (baby kangaroo) to sleep – ‘sleep is a present after a day that was gorgeous.’
Here is the lullaby as seen on ABC TV. Lovely, isn’t it? And so simple – a perfect addition to parents’ repertoire of lullabies. The board book format is robust enough to withstand chewing, sticky fingers, and anything else a baby can throw at it.The second sleep-themed book is by Byll & Beth Stephen: the Teeny Tiny Stevies, back again with their wry humour and charm, hitting the mark for sleep-deprived parents. In Sleep Through the Night, we explore the world of sleep – how other creatures (like dolphins, albatross, walruses, bats…) sleep in different ways – but always coming back to what we humans need. There is a touch of wishful thinking which adds to the humour:
Some species can sleep standing up straight,
but human beings need to be in a lying-down shape.
Some species can sleep
with their eyes open,
but most human beings
need to close them.The illustrations by Simon Howe are just gorgeous and add to the fantastical feel of this sleepy world: it’s a sweetly funny hymn to a good night’s sleep.
Now that sleep has been dealt with, how about those stormy feelings? The next two new releases are here to help.
The new Play School ‘Mindfully Me’ series helps to soothe troubled emotions in the very young, by exploring how friends – and taking a moment to Breathe In and Out – can make things right again. Written by Jan Stradling and illustrated by Jedda Robaard, we see Big Ted trying to deal with troublesome emotions. His friends come to visit, but Big Ted just doesn’t feel like playing. One by one, Jemima, Little Ted, Kiya and Humpty show Big Ted the different ways they calm their own stormy feelings. The beloved Play School characters will be instantly recognisable for small Aussie kids and the book uses simple text and gentle pictures to tell the story of how Big Ted learns to relax and enjoy his day.
Finally, we come to Sarah Ayoub’s new picture book, Nice and Slow. It’s all about how a family rediscovers the joys of a slow day:
Let’s take today nice and slow,
have a break from the go-go-go.
Spend some extra time in bed,
release the worries in our head.
Let’s make our breakfast a special treat,
banana pancakes cannot be beat!Hopefully most parents can remember those days as children, in school holidays or on a weekend, when we didn’t have ‘be somewhere’ or ‘do something’ – school, dance class, Saturday sport, music lesson. When we could hang about in our PJs until lunch, chatting to our family, playing a card game or riding our bike, making something or baking a cake. Just – because. That’s what this book is about. Recapturing that wonderful sense of freedom, connection and quietness, for ourselves and our younger generation. The illustrations by Mimi Purnell show a family doing just that. Nothing special or out of the ordinary: but actually, in contrast to the sometimes-frenetic pace of life, quite extraordinary.
So, four picture books to suit youngsters from babies to early primary age. And three of them just in time for Christmas – published by HarperCollins in late November 2022. Breathe In and Out will be released in January 2023.
My thanks to the publishers for copies to read and review.Love to share: ‘Family, All That You Dream it To Be’ by Byll & Beth Stephen
Serendipity. That magical process by which a seeming coincidence brings a gift and places it in your lap.
My recent serendipitous moment was having this lovely picture book sent to me for review. It’s the new ABC Kids’ book by the musical duo (and published authors) known as the ‘Teeny Tiny Stevies’.
Why is this serendipitous? Because just a month ago, I was sitting in a concert at the National Folk Festival in Canberra, listening to the music of the ‘Little Stevies’ – Byll & Beth Stephen. They were describing their entry into childrens’ music and even treated the audience to a gorgeous song for kids written during Covid lockdowns – all about the Covid lockdowns! Lovely stuff.
Family: All that you dream it to be is (as you might guess) all about family – all types of families. We follow a little girl and her mum as they enjoy a bike ride together around their neighbourhood, stopping to chat with people they know.
The families they talk to are all different: a family with single mum, one with two mums, one where their mum had died, one where dad stays home to look after the baby while mum goes out to work, among others.
The thing that all the families have in common is that there is love, and lots of it.
The warm and colourful illustrations by Simon Howe add much to the depictions of the children and their homes.
It’s a tender story, beautifully told, celebrating families everywhere.
The girl and her mum finish their ride,
Family: All that you dream it to be
the sun sets as they arrive home
and they go inside.
Her dad sets the table, her brother feeds the dog,
and she looks around at the people she most loves.
She thinks of all the families who live nearby,
how they’re all a bit different but also really alike.
Because they love each other as much as she loves
her people, that’s obvious to her, in fact it’s quite simple.
You just love who you love, and you build a great team,
because family’s all that you dream it to be.Family: All you dream it to be is published by ABC Kids’ Books and Harper Collins Children’s Books in June 2022.
My thanks to the publishers for a review copy.